Comcast allegedly tells 105Mbps customers not to use their own modems

Old document leads to ill communication.

An outdated document and a customer complaint indicate that Comcast employees are (mistakenly) telling some customers of its Extreme 105 service that they cannot use their own modems and must instead rent equipment from Comcast.

"So I purchased the Zoom 5341J to take advantage of the 8 downstream channels now available here," a Comcast customer, apparently from Virginia who goes by the user name "ExoticFish," wrote on a DSLReports forum Monday. The customer continued:

Since then I had some issues, not speed related necessarily. So normal customer service was unable to resolve them so I E-mailed Comcast's "Executive Support' team."

I got a call today from a guy. He was the rudest Comcast rep I had ever spoken to, EVER! Not only did he not resolve anything but he told me my modem is not approved for my package. I told him I previously had the SB 6120 on the same package for about a year now and both it and my new modem are on the approved modem list. He insisted that list is incorrect and I MUST RENT a modem from them to receive the correct speeds on Extreme 105! I requested he forward me this info and sure enough there was a document published (ID TLK1043) on February 26th stating "Only Comcast issued equipment ensures that the specifications are always met and not altered."

The document was posted on the forum and sent to the news site, Stop the Cap, which wrote about the incident yesterday. "Some customers are angry and frustrated to learn Comcast has stopped 'officially' allowing the use of customer-owned cable modems for its 105Mbps 'Extreme' service, insisting subscribers rent a company-supplied gateway for $8 a month," Stop the Cap's Phillip Dampier wrote.

A DSLReports story pointed out that a portion of the alleged Comcast memo contains spelling and grammar errors, possibly indicating that it isn't an official company document, but Comcast has chalked this up to a "miscommunication" between the DSLReports poster and a customer service representative. A Comcast spokesperson told Ars that he is "having someone try to figure out how to reach the poster, apologize, and fix this immediately... Xfinity Internet customers can either buy or rent modems."

"This is apparently an old document from when we first launched [Extreme] and when there weren't modems for sale at retail," the spokesperson wrote in an e-mail. "Four years later and there are plenty available on the approved devices list. The document is wrong and old, and we are working to figure out what happened."

“Only certified Comcast equipment”

The old document contains instructions to customer service representatives regarding the Extreme 105 service, which provides 105Mbps download and 20Mbps upload bandwidth. Along with a $249 installation fee, an FAQ in the document explains Comcast's policy on user-owned equipment:

Why do I need to use Comcast issued equipment? Only certified Comcast equipment delivers the ensured service speed attached to the customer’s account.

Comcast allows customers to use their own equipment for all your other Internet packages, why not Extreme 105? Generally customers can use their own equipment and configure it as they see fit. But for Extreme 105, the configuration must be done and maintained at certain specifications. Only Comcast issued equipment ensures that the specifications are always met and are not altered intentionally or unintentionally.

But I have a DOCSIS 3.0 Modem and N Router, why do I need your versions? Comcast installs equipment which have gone through extensive network certification process of Comcast and which have been proven in both laboratory and live network tests. This ensures that the equipment performs consistently and delivers the subscribed speed and services.

Does the $249 installation fee include installation of a wireless router? Yes, the installation fee includes the installation of Comcast owned wireless router.

Why is there a premium installation fee for Extreme 105? Extreme 105 is a premier Internet product by Comcast and the premium installation fee guarantees a speed of 105Mbps. A Comcast Certified Installation Technician performs additional tests which are not performed during installation of other premier internet service.

Is the premium installation fee refundable if I disconnect the service in 30, 60, 90 days? The installation fee is non-refundable.

Recent use of the old document made it appear that a new policy was in place.

"The Virginia customer never realized Comcast changed its policies until he had service problems," Dampier wrote. "It was then that a senior representative insisted the customer switch to Comcast’s rented gateway device if he wanted his service fixed. Other customers still using customer-owned equipment and subscribed to 105Mbps service may continue to fly under the radar for some time, and there does not seem to be any national effort to contact customers about their equipment."

A policy to prevent customers from using their own equipment would be at odds with Comcast's aforementioned public list of supported devices, which shows a few dozen Arris, Cisco, Motorola, Netgear, and other modems as being supported on the Extreme 105 service. The list of supported devices includes the Zoom 5341J owned by the customer who posted on DSLReports.

Such a policy might violate Section 629 of the Communications Act, which says consumers should be able to use third-party equipment, "or would if we enforced Sec. 629," tweeted Harold Feld, senior VP of consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge.

Houston-based Ars editor Lee Hutchinson says he is required to use a Comcast-issued modem and router for his 50Mbps business class broadband, which costs $110 a month plus $5 for a static IP address and an "equipment fee" of $10 a month. That's presumably because Comcast wants to sell a service including remote management, port forwarding, DNS, and DHCP, even though Hutchinson doesn't purchase that service.

The complaint on DSLReports kicked off a thread of customers complaining about Comcast's modem policies. One commenter said that "Even if you own your own modem, Comcast may charge you a rental fee (by accident of course)," to which another responded: "At this point I wouldn't say that would be an accident. It has happened to people for many many years and many many times. Comcast knows of this and still does nothing to correct it from happening in the first place."

Perhaps not coincidentally, Comcast was ranked by Consumer Reports as one of the least liked Internet providers, just barely ahead of Time Warner Cable, which is set to be acquired by Comcast for $45.2 billion.

Promoted Comments

Comcast confirmed the memo was authentic this afternoon after being unsure about its origin earlier. It now turns out it was written in 2010. A customer service rep reportedly from "executive customer service" sent a copy of the memo to the customer, but the date on it was changed to late February 2014.

Charlie Douglas from Comcast said the policy originated a time when there were no modems capable of supporting 105Mbps speeds, so customers had to rent them from Comcast.

That no longer being true, Comcast now says you can keep using customer owned equipment for 105Mbps.

Is that grammatically correct, or should it have a 'their' between the words 'use' and 'own'?

Edit:

Quote:

Comcast has chalked this up to a "miscommunication" between the DSLReports poster and a customer service representative. A Comcast spokesperson told Ars that he is "having someone try to figure out how to reach the poster, apologize, and fix this immediately."

"This is apparently an old document from when we first launched [Extreme 105] and when there weren't modems for sale at retail," the spokesperson wrote in an e-mail. "Four years later and there are plenty available on the approved devices list. The document is wrong and old, and we are working to figure out what happened."

That headline is a bit disconcerting given this part of the story. So they can use their own equipment, then?

That's pretty normal for Comcast tech support level of competence. There has been more than a few time when I've had to repeatedly ask them to forward me to a tech that knows how to use a PC for more than Facebook. It's insane they can get away with hiring people whom know less than my mom about computers and are expected to troubleshoot customer computer problems.

I just spoke with Comcast yesterday about their 50 and 105 Mbit packages and the rep made no mention of me needing to rent a modem for a 105 package. He did say it had a $250 "professional" installation, which I don't know what the point of that was... But he encouraged me to get the 50 Mbit service instead as it was a far better deal.

I'll also add that each time I've dealt with Comcast their reps were jerks and not very knowledgeable. Yesterday I dealt with 3 and each was quite knowledgeable and very polite. Your mileage may vary.

I recently had a similar issue - called to negotiate my rate, and the customer service rep tried to up sell me to their high tier Internet service and told me that I would need to rent their modem. I have my own SB6121 which works perfectly. When I asked to speak to another rep about pricing, I found out that the previous guy had signed me up for a bundle (I have and only want Internet). I have to wonder if this is the result of aggressive incentives to get the sales reps to push bundles and rented equipment, rather than a de facto policy.

I was gone from the house for a day a few weeks back and the internet went out. So my wife called Comcast for help. I think they quickly picked up that she was not all that tech saavy and immediately tried to blame their service outage on our (very much on the approved list) cable modem.

They lied to her and said we needed to go back to renting the modem (LOL), and then they tried to sell her the Triple Play Package - which we have no need for.

A Comcast spokesperson told Ars that he is "having someone try to figure out how to reach the poster, apologize, and fix this immediately."

"This is apparently an old document from when we first launched [Extreme 105] and when there weren't modems for sale at retail," the spokesperson wrote in an e-mail. "Four years later and there are plenty available on the approved devices list. The document is wrong and old, and we are working to figure out what happened."

“Only certified Comcast equipment”

Comcast did not say whether the document is authentic.

Both of those statements can't be accurate. The first says it is authentic but old and no longer valid. It doesn't seem like comcast is saying the document is not authentic just no longer valid.

Also Comcast is most likely stating you are required to use there hardware since it is easier to debug since it removes 1 more variable.

Comcast confirmed the memo was authentic this afternoon after being unsure about its origin earlier. It now turns out it was written in 2010. A customer service rep reportedly from "executive customer service" sent a copy of the memo to the customer, but the date on it was changed to late February 2014.

Charlie Douglas from Comcast said the policy originated a time when there were no modems capable of supporting 105Mbps speeds, so customers had to rent them from Comcast.

That no longer being true, Comcast now says you can keep using customer owned equipment for 105Mbps.

My experience, over 10 years or so (in MA), is that Comcast internet is reliable and sufficiently fast for my needs, though I belive it is overpriced.

Caveat: as long as you don't call them for *anything*. That one act will take weeks to straighten out, before you are back where you started. Without fail, over those past 10 years, any contact with Comcast has resulted in "issues".

The Time Warner Cable rep that had to come out to install my 30Mbit service after I moved told me I couldn't use my own equipment, saying "it can't handle the speed of this package", despite having the same hardware work on the same package. Also, I think Juniper knows how to build a pretty decent router, probably a bit better than the crap ones TWC installs.

In the end, I had to let him set up the crappy Arris router/modem combo which would crash every few hours and had terrible WiFi performance. The next day I drove to the nearest Time Warner Cable office, dropped off their router/modem combo, provisioned my old SurfBoard modem, and I was good to go.

Its still incredibly frustrating that I had to pay to have a guy set up some equipment that was worse than my own equipment just to return it. Also, the old equipment was already working before the rep came out! My old modem was still provisioned before he came, and I was already using the internet package. I paid someone to break my internet and then drive to their office to return the sub-par equipment. Just the costs of doing business with Time Warner Cable.

I experienced this and misinformation regarding installation fees firsthand when trying to upgrade from Blast to Extreme 105. I had to call their cancellations department to get someone knowledgeable enough to do the upgrade.

I just spoke with Comcast yesterday about their 50 and 105 Mbit packages and the rep made no mention of me needing to rent a modem for a 105 package. He did say it had a $250 "professional" installation, which I don't know what the point of that was... But he encouraged me to get the 50 Mbit service instead as it was a far better deal.

I'll also add that each time I've dealt with Comcast their reps were jerks and not very knowledgeable. Yesterday I dealt with 3 and each was quite knowledgeable and very polite. Your mileage may vary.

My experience with Comcast customer service was at worst typical customer service and at best, acceptable service.

With the low end being a result of a person going down a checklist and taking forever to get to the endpoint of "OK I'll just reset your connection on our end" to "We see a problem and we'll get schedule a tech guy to come over." And when the tech guy did arrive, even though I don't think he was supposed to fiddle with the splitters/coax cables in our house since we'd have to pay for that (and none of us agreed to pay for it), he ended up doing it anyway to fix our connection free of charge.

Well, the latter example might be a bit glorified since that was years ago and I don't remember the particulars, just that there was very little fuss throughout that whole ordeal and our internet connection was fine afterwards.

Keep in mind that I also have Verizon in my area so the service might be seemingly better because they have competition.

We've also always used our own modem and router. Made sure our modem was DOCSIS 3.0 compliant a few years back too.

Looking at the language provided, does it actually explicitly say anywhere that a Comcast modem MUST be used? The stuff posted seems to hint that they're not specifically saying you can't use your own equipment, but they can't "ensure" the speeds and service they advertise.

Obviously, still not the least bit helpful. Much like how my HP printer warns of doom and gloom when I pop a non-HP ink cart into it. But still a difference between "we recommend you don't, because we can't be held responsible if your service implodes" and "thou shall not use your own equipment".

Houston-based Ars editor Lee Hutchinson says he is required to use a Comcast-issued modem and router for his 50Mbps business class broadband, which costs $110 a month plus an "equipment fee" of $10 a month. That's presumably because Comcast wants to sell a service including remote management, port forwarding, DNS, and DHCP, even though Hutchinson doesn't purchase that service.

I live in Houston, have the same business class service as Lee, and I use my own SB6141. You only have to rent a modem from Comcast if you have a static ip. If you have a dynamic ip, you can use any of the modems on the approved list for business class internet.

Doesn't Comcast automatically enable guest wifi access through its rental equipment? Wouldn't it make sense for Comcast to push Comcast wireless routers on people with the highest tier of access so that the mandatory Xfinity wifi guest access would have the best access to the network? And then quickly dial back the rhetoric when they get called out on it, of course....

Doesn't Comcast automatically enable guest wifi access through its rental equipment? Wouldn't it make sense for Comcast to push Comcast wireless routers on people with the highest tier of access so that the mandatory Xfinity wifi guest access would have the best access to the network? And then quickly dial back the rhetoric when they get called out on it, of course....

Edit: apostrophes.

the line speed is set up in softwareyou can have the slowest tier of service and the max speed will still be 105mbps or whatever the line is capable of

Is that grammatically correct, or should it have a 'their' between the words 'use' and 'own'?

Edit:

Quote:

Comcast has chalked this up to a "miscommunication" between the DSLReports poster and a customer service representative. A Comcast spokesperson told Ars that he is "having someone try to figure out how to reach the poster, apologize, and fix this immediately."

"This is apparently an old document from when we first launched [Extreme 105] and when there weren't modems for sale at retail," the spokesperson wrote in an e-mail. "Four years later and there are plenty available on the approved devices list. The document is wrong and old, and we are working to figure out what happened."

That headline is a bit disconcerting given this part of the story. So they can use their own equipment, then?

That's pretty normal for Comcast tech support level of competence. There has been more than a few time when I've had to repeatedly ask them to forward me to a tech that knows how to use a PC for more than Facebook. It's insane they can get away with hiring people whom know less than my mom about computers and are expected to troubleshoot customer computer problems.

Did you try unplugging it, waiting 30 seconds, then plugging it back in again? Ok, sir, is there a router connected? Ok, you need to unplug your router and plug the computer in directly to the modem...

I've been paying for Comcast modem rental because I use their VOIP service, and am on the 50mbp package. I haven't been able to find a docsis 3.0 modem that will also do VOIP for sale, although I haven't looked terribly hard.

If you use a Comcast supplied modem, Comcast guarantees that everything will just work but yet if a customer supplies the very exact modem as the Comcast modem, there is no guarantee. WTF???

I have 25/5 with Comcast and I use my own modem. After 8 years of paying a rental fee each month I finally wised up.

still use a time warner modem, but chances are that a comcast modem will be set up to have settings on the back end equipment to match the modem. and since comcast has access to it, they can write scripts to make mass changes if they make a change on their back end like for firmware updates, etc

I had 50Mbps in Chicago, used my own modem/router and everything worked just fine. I have TWC now in LA with 30 down and not only am I using the same modem and router but I'm also using a internet over power line device and still getting 30.

"Why is there a premium installation fee for Extreme 105? Extreme 105 is a premier Internet product by Comcast and the premium installation fee guarantees a speed of 105Mbps. A Comcast Certified Installation Technician performs additional tests which are not performed during installation of other premier internet service."

Can I wave the additional tests and pay the regular already to high price?

I've been paying for Comcast modem rental because I use their VOIP service, and am on the 50mbp package. I haven't been able to find a docsis 3.0 modem that will also do VOIP for sale, although I haven't looked terribly hard.

Still, getting rid of the 8$ a month rental fee would be worth it...

I just cancelled voice, got the blast plus tv with HBO + 50mbps for $95, and bought an ooma VOIP device, it's $125 and then all you pay is the tax for the phone line currently about $4 in my area.

You should look into it, especially if you don't need a lot of channels.

Is that grammatically correct, or should it have a 'their' between the words 'use' and 'own'?

Edit:

Quote:

Comcast has chalked this up to a "miscommunication" between the DSLReports poster and a customer service representative. A Comcast spokesperson told Ars that he is "having someone try to figure out how to reach the poster, apologize, and fix this immediately."

"This is apparently an old document from when we first launched [Extreme 105] and when there weren't modems for sale at retail," the spokesperson wrote in an e-mail. "Four years later and there are plenty available on the approved devices list. The document is wrong and old, and we are working to figure out what happened."

That headline is a bit disconcerting given this part of the story. So they can use their own equipment, then?

That's pretty normal for Comcast tech support level of competence. There has been more than a few time when I've had to repeatedly ask them to forward me to a tech that knows how to use a PC for more than Facebook. It's insane they can get away with hiring people whom know less than my mom about computers and are expected to troubleshoot customer computer problems.

I had a bad experience with a repair tech. They're very hit and miss too.

I must be in the minority. I have Blast Plus which is Blast (50/10mbps internet) with Economy TV (~45 channels) and this past month upgraded to Extreme 105/20 for an extra $10/month. I use my own modem, which is the same Zoom modem in the article. There was no installation fee for them to flip the switch. My monthly bill is $65 which has the threaten to leave discount which gets reapplied at the end of each promo.

I get a consistent Speedtest in the 120/25 range any time of the day. Those that are saying you only hit those speeds when everyone is offline must have an old DOSCIS 2.0 modem or a bad signal. Once they went with the multiple channel bonded modems (I get 8 downstream and 3 upstream) the traffic slowdown problems mainly disappeared.

Just to share my own funny story. To keep it short, I was trying to setup a hardware VPN and the modem was blocking the port for some reason. Support couldn't help me and ended up giving me the manufacturers number for support. The thing was, it was the ISP's number to call in on and not for other people. The guy on the other end was like, how did you get this number and who are you, upon telling him, I got a. Yeah, they shouldn't have given you this number and sorry I can't help you.

While I don't have 105Mbps I am surprised at the level of support people get through Comcast. While I find some of my experiences to be "bad" they're no worse than my dealings with any other telecom, if not better on average (though that's not saying much.)

The biggest problem is most techs are just contractors and if you live in an area without skilled techs, you're going to get awful service. Unfortunately, switching providers rarely changes anything. At one point I had Verizon and Dish and the same tech came to my house to set up either, he was just wearing a different hat. Still, They won't hook it up right, they will send ONE ping and say "Yep, good latency" and one time I actually had to make a presentation to tell someone what "Packet loss" was. THAT was fun.

Still, I'd rather be with Comcast than Verizon or Time Warner. I get on average 10% higher bandwidth than I'm paying for. The only problem used to be Netflix, but no more.

I'm no shill by any means, they're far from perfect... but I always wonder why such a focus on Comcast when Verizon won't even tell you how much you'll be paying until AFTER you renew your contract, or Time Warner whose prices have absolutely skyrocketed while simultaneously dropping channels like MSG during Hockey or Basketball Seasons...

Though they're certainly a "Duriel" level of Evil, they are no "Mephisto." ....yeah, been playing a lot of Diablo lately.

I must be in the minority. I have Blast Plus which is Blast (50/10mbps internet) with Economy TV (~45 channels) and this past month upgraded to Extreme 105/20 for an extra $10/month. I use my own modem, which is the same Zoom modem in the article. There was no installation fee for them to flip the switch. My monthly bill is $65 which has the threaten to leave discount which gets reapplied at the end of each promo.

I get a consistent Speedtest in the 120/25 range any time of the day. Those that are saying you only hit those speeds when everyone is offline must have an old DOSCIS 2.0 modem or a bad signal. Once they went with the multiple channel bonded modems (I get 8 downstream and 3 upstream) the traffic slowdown problems mainly disappeared.

This. Corporate policies would be universal if done at that level, the biggest problem is that regional techs in many areas are quite awful and will feed you INCORRECT information, which is what this article is really about. Comcast's TRUE policies aren't that bad, but the amount of absolute BS that their techs spout is really giving their company a bad name.

It's perfectly rational for customers to assume that the people that work for Comcast are giving accurate information, but I've learned you can call Comcast 5 times and get 5 different answers sometimes. When I had a particular issue escalated, I've heard that different call centers have different procedures and some don't have the most recent documents. If you call the same 1-800 number again, you may be directed to a completely different business handling your call and they may have access to information that the others don't.

The back-end is awful and needs a lot of work. It blows my mind how in 2014 how so many different branches can be on completely different pages (or books, for that matter.) That's why people are getting awful service, I presume.